


According to Plan

by thisprettywren



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Gen, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-10
Updated: 2011-03-10
Packaged: 2017-10-16 20:43:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/169148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisprettywren/pseuds/thisprettywren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pyrrhic victories: a bit too much his area.</p>
            </blockquote>





	According to Plan

 

It was not a simple plan. That might have been the first mistake, really, but Sherlock was trying not to think about that, trying to focus on the task at hand.

(Task. _Christ_.)

It was supposed to go like this.

Mycroft had made up the dummy shipment records, passed them along to Lestrade, as requested. That was going to be Sherlock’s in: telling the syndicate how and where to get the papers. How and where to find _Lestrade_ , it meant, but that part was all right; Sherlock had been able to give him a heads up.

While the other three were out confronting him, Sherlock was going to slip away and meet John, give him the details, the location. They didn’t trust Sherlock yet; he’d been stuck, hardly had a moment to himself, for nearly two weeks. It was really only a chance he’d managed to set the whole thing up at all. But he’d tell John, and John would tell the Yard, and everything would work out with minimal casualties (and maximum sentences) on both sides.

How it actually went was this.

The thugs went to meet Lestrade, Sherlock slipped out and went to the place he and John had planned to meet.

John wasn’t there.

Sherlock made it back to the warehouse (cliché, _dull_ ) in time, but only just. He’d barely slipped back through the unlatched window before he heard the sound of the car pulling up.

Too many pairs of feet on the steps. They’d panicked, then. How amateur. Sherlock was disgusted, which was a comforting feeling, given the alternative.

For a sickening moment he thought the hooded figure being pushed down the steps was John. But, no, that would have been all right, because they’d done this sort of thing before. Well, not precisely _this_ sort of thing, but similar things. Been in similarly tight spots.

Bassett forced the man down into the chair and it wasn’t John, it was— _oh._

Sherlock had barely a moment to rearrange his face into the appropriate expression before Lestrade’s blinking eyes found his.

"Someone," Sherlock said, in the flattest, most menacing tone he could manage, "has done something _deeply_ stupid."

 

* * *

 

Lestrade took in a long, slow breath.

Okay. It could still be a great deal worse.

It was odd, seeing Sherlock in anything other than his usual suits and button-downs, but the man looked otherwise like himself: composed, calm, assessing. Doubtless he had a plan.

Lestrade hoped he had a plan.

One of the other blokes was handcuffing him to the chair he was sitting in. With his own cuffs, damn it all. Sherlock fixed one of the others with his pale gaze.

“I’d be rather interested to hear,” he said, slowly, and he sounded almost _amused_ , “what you might possibly have been thinking.”

“Well, there was this little chap,” the dark-haired man was saying, “and when Ave—“

“Don’t,” Sherlock said sharply, raising a warning hand with a glance in Lestrade’s direction.

 _Good man, Sherlock,_ he thought gratefully. It was bad enough that they’d let him see their faces, Lestrade knew, but Sherlock was going to keep them from identifying themselves further, starting them early with the assumption that they’d be letting him go. Sherlock himself would be able to identify them, of course, though there was no way they’d know that.

 _Have to remember not to call him by name, either_ , Lestrade reminded himself. Of all the ways to blow his cover, get them both killed.

“… right. Well, the little chap just started shouting,” Dark Hair was saying. “And we couldn’t sort out what we’d done, see? To make him think anything was up. We were just talking. So this bloke must’ve known, somehow. Been tipped off, brought backup. You said he’s a copper, right?”

Sherlock chuckled derisively. “Not quite. Works with them, obviously, but he’s just forensics. Bit of a little weasel.”

Lestrade clenched his jaw, but it was to stop himself from smiling. _Trust Sherlock_ , he thought, _to come up with_ Anderson _in a situation like this._ Smart move, though, downplaying his position. He was gambling on none of them recognising Lestrade from the telly, and it seemed the gamble was paying off.

“Won’t be missed, then,” the taller light-haired man said thoughtfully.

“Of course he’ll be missed,” Sherlock snapped. “I did just say he _works_ with the Yard, didn’t I?”

“Yeah,” Taller said, “but who was the other one, then?”

“What happened to him?” If Lestrade hadn’t known to look for it he wouldn’t have seen the tightening at the corners of Sherlock’s mouth.

“Left him in the street.” A shrug, and there was the minute jump of a muscle in Sherlock’s jaw.

 _Damn it, John_ , Lestrade thought. They’d gone out for a pint—it’d been quiet the last few weeks, with Sherlock here, and John actually seemed a bit bored—and John must have followed him. What could he have been thinking? Lestrade didn’t need a bodyguard, even if that bodyguard was an ex-army surgeon with a service weapon he pretended he didn’t know about.

Then again, he thought, feeling the bite of the cuffs against his wrists, his current situation did seem to put the lie to that assertion. A bit.

“In the street. Did anyone see you?”

“We didn’t touch him,” the third man chimed in, and Sherlock’s eyes flicked to Lestrade’s, just for a moment, seeking confirmation. Nodding seemed imprudent but Sherlock seemed to get the message anyway; Lestrade saw him relax, fractionally. “He was half a street down.”

“Maybe you’re not entirely daft, then,” Sherlock said, turning away, “So we’ll just wait until later, dump him somewhere, he doesn’t know where we are or—“

“Wait a minute, though,” Shorter broke in. “About the other chap. How _did_ he know? There must have been a tip-off.”

Sherlock grew very still, and Lestrade tried not to hold his own breath.

 _Minefield._

“Yes,” Sherlock hissed, whirling to face Lestrade, coming close with two long strides and bending low, bringing those pale eyes mere inches from his own. “You knew,” he said, and _Christ_ , the coldness in his face. “How. How did you know.”

If Lestrade hadn’t known better he would have thought— well, would have thought Sherlock were precisely what he claimed to be. The thought sent a shiver down his spine, even as he rejected its accuracy.

Lestrade couldn’t settle on the best way to answer so he stayed silent. It wasn’t a proper kidnapping—not really, or not _yet_ , he wasn’t sure which was more accurate—but he found himself running through his training nonetheless. _Don’t give them anything you don’t have to. When you do have to give them something, though, don’t hesitate about it. Only lie when it can’t be avoided. Keep as close to the truth as possible; makes it easier to avoid getting caught out._

Sherlock turned away, went over to stand by the window, scrubbed a hand through his hair.

Then Shorter was crouching in front of him. He had a broad face with a thick bunching of muscles along the jaw, and Lestrade watched them move as he spoke. “You know what would work,” he said, almost casually, and even if Lestrade had been able to shift out of the path of the blow he wouldn’t have had any warning to do so.

The man struck him hard across the cheek and he felt the area over the bone begin to swell almost immediately, his head snapping back hard on his neck, his ears ringing.

When they cleared, Sherlock was speaking in a low, dangerous-sounding voice. “— worst idea I could possibly imagine.”

“I don’t know,” Shorter said, and bloody _fuck_ , he’d pulled a knife from somewhere, was playing with it casually just inches from Lestrade’s knee. “If he’s just some snivelling little thing, it won’t take much to get him to tell us, will it? Then we’ll know. If there’s a leak, we can fix it.”

Dark Hair was eyeing Sherlock suspiciously. “I think,” he said, “if there’s a leak, I know where it’d be, yeah?”

“Don’t be stupid,” Sherlock said impatiently, and if Lestrade hadn’t known better he wouldn’t have been able to detect anything but arrogance in his tone.

“Prove it, then,” Shorter said. “If it’s not you, you’ll want to hear it as much as the rest of us. So. You’ll make him.”

Sherlock’s face was a careful blank.

“You’ll make him,” Shorter went on, raising the knife higher, “or you’ll watch while I do,” and brought it down with force, embedding the tip of the blade in Lestrade’s thigh.

He’d be forgiven, Lestrade thought, if things had gone a bit grey and yellow for a moment, but he was fairly sure Sherlock had scarcely even blinked.

“Oh, come off it,” Sherlock said, and how he was still managing to sound impatient was a mystery Lestrade couldn’t unravel just then, but he’d pulled the knife out of Lestrade’s thigh and was regarding it impassively. “Outside. Now.”

Then he was alone, and Lestrade tried to breathe through the pain, tried to think of something useful he could do, but it seemed the whole situation was a bit out of his hands at the moment.

 _Nothing for it but to trust Sherlock, then,_ he thought. He did trust him, daily, in all sorts of situations.

Lestrade could almost convince himself this was no different.

Almost.

Still. He’d follow his lead, play along, trust that genius brain of his to come up with a plan to get them both out of there. _Damn_.

He wished the chair back were higher. He would have liked very much to be able to lean his head against something and close his eyes.

Then he heard the door open and they were returning. Sherlock still had the knife, and the expression on his face was one of such extravagant, deliberate inscrutability that it belied the very anxiety Lestrade knew it was designed to conceal.

This was how it got worse, then.

Sherlock was standing over him. “Right,” he said, and Lestrade felt the low rumble of his voice run down his spine, settle at its base in a curl of anxiety.

“This is how it’s going to work.”

 

* * *

 

Sherlock thought he’d had worse days. He could recall four, offhand, and suspected there were others buried in his memory if he wanted to dig around for them.

It was oddly reassuring, keeping things in perspective. Distracting, too, and this wasn’t the time for such indulgences. One of the few factors keeping this day the not-quite-worst was his ability to concentrate, to make this look good without slipping.

Factors to consider: permanence, degree of debilitation. No room in that calculation for amount of pain, so he had to discount that consideration outright.

Objectively speaking the safest place to start was probably the face, but— no. Not yet. Not unless he had to.

He wasn’t able to be truly objective, then, and Sherlock would have liked to take the necessary time to analyse that realisation, but he really couldn’t afford it just then.

All this ran through Sherlock’s brain as Lestrade kept his eyes fixed on the knife in his hands. Sherlock kept his eyes on Lestrade’s face. He was trying to deconstruct Lestrade’s body into its constituent parts, identify the precise physiognomical elements he would be encountering ( _encountering_ —he almost chuckled as his brain turned over the word) and sort out just _where_ —

They both started slightly when Lestrade’s phone started to ring.

“Idiots,” Sherlock growled at the others as he lunged forward and fumbled in Lestrade’s jacket pocket The man actually flinched away from him and it made the back of Sherlock’s neck prickle hotly for just a moment, but he couldn’t dwell on that.

The display on the mobile showed John’s number. Sherlock hastily flicked off the ringer then slipped the mobile into his own pocket, pressing the button to connect the call as he did so.

It might make everything a great deal worse.

A risk worth taking, though.

“You know,” he said, “you lot have forgotten something rather important, which is that his friend saw you with him.”

“And?” Bassett asked, brows drawn together in anger.

“And,” Sherlock went on, “if he is who I suspect he is, you’re going to want to do something about that. It was stupid to grab this one to begin with, but, as they say, in for a penny. You’re going to need to go pick him up.”

“I’m not leaving you alone with him.”

“Send them, then,” Sherlock said, as though it were the least-interesting thing in the world, indicating the other two men. “Soon would be good, don’t you think? Before he has a chance to alert the _entire_ Yard as to what’s happened to their colleague. Though you may be too late already.”

Lestrade’s mobile was heavy in his pocket, a solid, comforting weight.

He hoped John was listening.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Lestrade didn’t know what Sherlock was playing at, giving the men Lestrade’s own address and sending them there. If it was just to separate them, it wouldn’t work for long; they’d find his flat empty and come right back. All it would accomplish would be pissing them off further.

Sherlock’s hand went back to Lestrade’s pocket, emerging with the key to the cuffs pinched carefully between thumb and forefinger.

Shorter stood angrily.

“The hands are such wonderfully delicate instruments, aren’t they?” Sherlock said smoothly. It made Lestrade’s hair stand on end. “So many nerve endings. So useful for our particular purposes, though I’ll need better access to make proper use of them. You must have some gaffer’s tape around here somewhere,” he said to the thug, who grunted in assent and made his way over to the far side of the large space.

Sherlock’s long fingers twined in Lestrade’s hair, pulled his head back. “Fight me. Need to make this look real,” he said quickly in a voice barely above a whisper. “He’s a suspicious sort, won’t buy it if you fold too quickly.” Footsteps as the other man approached, dropped something heavy just out of Lestrade’s line of vision. “Both learn something today, then,” Sherlock said, loudly enough for Shorter to hear, and released his hold on Lestrade’s hair with a last, vicious yank.

He was right, of course. Damn him. Damn it _all,_ really, straight to hell and back.

Sherlock handed the keys to Shorter, who knelt at the back of the chair to undo the cuffs. Sherlock leaned forward and pressed his thumb just to the edge of the fresh wound on Lestrade’s thigh. Lestrade groaned as the pressure sent a fresh wave of pain crashing over him. He could feel his trousers, damp with his own blood, sticking to the skin of his leg.

“Now,” Sherlock said, his voice low, his eyes mere inches from Lestrade’s own (he didn’t want to look at them; couldn’t help it, they filled his whole field of vision), “you’re going to cooperate and tell us what we need, or—“

 _Fight me,_ Sherlock’s voice echoed in his head, and the moment Lestrade felt the first cuff slip free he whipped his arm around and tried to hit him. He really did try, too, but his muscles were already stiff from holding one position for so long and there were two of them (Sherlock on the other side of the fight, of course, and being plenty rough about it, too) and it felt like no time at all before he felt his wrists being taped to the arms of the chair.

So much for that, then. Lestrade would wonder, later, what would have happened if he’d succeeded in pulling himself free at that early stage, if it would have saved them both what was coming.

Didn’t matter, though; he hadn’t managed it. He’d missed his chance.

Sherlock was standing in front of him again. Lestrade focused his eyes on the knife because it was safer, somehow, than looking into those cold eyes, even though he _knew_.

“Now,” Sherlock said, “there’s something I need to know.” Reaching out one pale, long-fingered hand in a gesture that was almost casual, he grasped the littlest finger on Lestrade’s left hand. One sharp motion and Lestrade heard, then felt, the snap of the bone as it broke.

Sherlock’s voice cut through the clamour in Lestrade’s head, the ragged sound of his own breathing: “You’re going to tell me.”

 

* * *

 

Sherlock was very carefully _not_ thinking about the contents of the toolkit Bassett had brought over. _Hammer, pliers, screwdriver_.

Right, then. _Trying_ not to think about the contents.

Broken bones: dramatic. Serious enough to be convincing. Painful enough to elicit an appropriate response from Lestrade. Broken bones would heal, particularly if he could control the circumstances.

Sherlock knew the best ways to get a clean break from his experiments at the morgue. Then again, impossible to duplicate those exact conditions. Would it make a difference that Lestrade would inevitably jerk away at the moment of impact?

Best not resort to that, then, just yet. Too many unknown variables.

Feet: out of the question, in case an opportunity presented itself to get Lestrade out of there. One thigh already damaged, so a possibility, though not ideal.

For now, best to focus on torso and upper extremities.

Hands: small fingers, left hand, both available. There was a gun somewhere, and Sherlock had a vague notion that, if he had a chance to engineer Lestrade’s escape, he’d like to give it to him, since the man would be in no condition to fight with more directly-physical means. The _why_ of that particular condition skittered across his brain and Sherlock pushed it away impatiently. _Not important_ , he told himself ruthlessly.

The screwdriver might be useful, actually; painful enough to force a reaction, yes, but perhaps not as damaging as the knife. (Then again: dirty, chance of infection. Didn’t want to think about a timeline long enough where such factors became relevant, but couldn’t rule it out entirely.)

Blood. Blood was dramatic, persuasive, blood might convince Bassett in a way gentler methods wouldn’t.

Too much chance of a slip-up in the arms, too narrow a passageway, arteries and veins crowded too close together with capillaries and less-dangerous territory.

He couldn’t look Lestrade in the face as he reached forward and yanked the buttons on his shirt open.

“I’m sure your loyalty is much appreciated,” he heard himself say, “but I think you might do well to recognise that it’s also extremely foolish.”

(That was truth, if he’d ever spoken it in his life. _Christ._ )

He brought the knife forward and drew it quickly along the line of Lestrade’s rib. Blood welled in the cut then spilled down his skin, soaking into the waistband of his trousers. Sherlock saw the twitch of the muscle as Lestrade tried to pull away, heard the intake of breath.

Still couldn’t look up.

Knife, next rib. Blood welled and spilled, pulsing slightly in time with Lestrade’s increasingly-rapid heartbeat.

“Easiest thing in the world, to make this stop.”

Third rib got an actual moan, and the blood slicking the skin was going to make it harder to find the fourth one. (Should have started with the bottom rib. Failed to anticipate. Stupid.)

Sherlock sat back on his heels, forcing himself to look at Lestrade’s face.

Lestrade was looking resolutely over Sherlock’s head at the opposite wall. Sherlock could see the bunch of muscles in his jaw as he clenched it, the tendons standing out in his neck as he fought down whatever noises he wanted to make. He had his right fist clenched hard; left fist would have been too painful with the finger, of course, and Sherlock felt a pang of regret for having taken that from him so early.

(Entirely unhelpful thought, he berated himself. Sherlock pushed it away violently.)

“There probably are things in your life that are worth this,” Sherlock said, “but I doubt very much that this is one of them. No one would blame you. All I need is a name, then it’s all over. Then you can go home.”

Lestrade closed his eyes and his lips twitched, but he didn’t say a word.

Bassett was beginning to pace, impatiently. Sherlock took a deep breath, wiped some of the blood from Lestrade’s torso with his thumb, and pressed the tip of the knife into the next rib.

 

* * *

 

“You can stop all of this,” he heard Sherlock say, and chanced a glance at his face. When their eyes met the expression in Sherlock’s flashed, briefly, to one Lestrade couldn’t quite read. Pleading, almost, he thought; but then it was gone.

Between the burning sting of the cuts in his side and the ache in his hand, Lestrade realised that there were entire stretches—minutes at a time—during which he forgot altogether that they were acting. The blood loss likely wasn’t helping his concentration, either, though he was sure Sherlock would have thought of that, that he couldn’t have lost as much as it felt like he had.

“I thought you said this would be _quick,_ ” he heard the second man say.

“ _You_ said that. I made no such claim,” Sherlock snapped at him, standing and moving away.

Lestrade let out a breath of relief, hissing at the renewed pain in his chest at the movement. _Yes, argue, _he thought, _forget about me, I’ll wait.___

“The other two will be back soon,” Shorter was saying, “and then we’ll have that other bloke to deal with, and you’re still faffing around with _this_ one.” He heard Sherlock make an almost-amused, disapproving noise in his throat, a noise familiar from so many other contexts that it was both disconcerting and oddly comforting.

There was a movement behind him and Lestrade’s world disappeared into a sudden explosion, bright starbursts of pain obscuring his vision as something heavy hit him hard on the back of the head.

Lestrade didn’t pass out, precisely, but he swam in blackness for a few moments, disoriented, until he heard Sherlock’s voice again behind him. Focused on it.

“Yes, perfect,” Sherlock said derisively. “Knock him unconscious, that’s _precisely_ the way to go about getting information out of someone, you idiot.”

Sherlock’s voice was receding. He was _leaving_ , why was he leaving, he wouldn’t do that. Would he? Lestrade thought not. He’d leave if he could. Something must be keeping them both there, then.

 _You’re confused,_ he told himself. _Concussion._ He’d been concussed before, a few times. The feeling was familiar.

Footsteps as Sherlock reappeared in his field of vision.

“Aren’t going to get anything out of him at all in this state, you useless sod,” Sherlock was saying irritably. Lestrade realised the two men had been talking the whole time and he’d tuned it out, had lost the thread entirely.

“Here,” Sherlock said, kneeling down in front of him. “Drink this.” He held a cup of water to Lestrade’s dry mouth. _How’d he know?_ Lestrade wondered as he drank thirstily, ignoring the few drops that escaped the side of his mouth.

When the cup was empty Sherlock set it on the ground. “I apologise for my colleague,” Sherlock said with a quirk of his mouth. “He wasn’t thinking.”

Lestrade would have laughed at that if he could have done so without it hurting. “You’re good at this,” he said, surprised at how hoarse his own voice sounded. The corners of Sherlock’s eyes twitched for a moment before his face resumed its former expression.

“Ready to tell us now?” There was a cruel edge to Sherlock’s voice again, and _right_ , this was a game, they were supposed to—

Oh, _bugger._ He could feel it, that crowd of words forcing its way up his throat. It happened to him, sometimes, when he bashed his head; this urge to babble. Mostly it was just a bit embarrassing, but now…

Now, though. Now it was dangerous, this impulse. It would get them both killed—he knew that much, though his brain was a bit foggy from the impact and he couldn’t remember how it was meant to do that, just that it _would_ —and he couldn’t stop it.

Sherlock didn’t know ( _did he?_ Lestrade thought not). He had to tell him, had to warn him.

“Sher—“ he began, and then his breath was stolen from him as the felt the knife drive back into his thigh, right beside the first wound.

“I’m not a patient man, and you,” he heard Sherlock say, his voice low and menacingly steady, “have just run out of time.”

 

* * *

 

Right. This was going to make things a bit more complicated.

Sherlock needed a minute alone with Lestrade, just to make sure. It was just Bassett (couldn’t factor in the other two; he’d lost track of time, _stupid_ ); he could neutralise him, put a stop to all this. It would have meant blowing his cover and ending the operation, though, losing the major player for which they were vying.

Pyrrhic victories. A bit too much his area.

Better to leave the decision up to Lestrade, then.

He ran his hand through the blood on Lestrade’s chest and held it up ostentatiously. “Get me a towel or something, would you?” he sneered at Bassett.

Lestrade was just looking at him, lips clamped together, not making a sound. Stubborn. It was infuriating. _Why,_ when he _needed_ — He pressed his free hand against Lestrade’s injured thigh, eliciting a yell of surprise. _Better_.

“And something to gag him with, while you’re at it,” he said, trying to sound annoyed.

As soon as the door closed behind Bassett, Sherlock knelt in front of Lestrade and grabbed his shoulder. “Greg.” Lestrade’s eyes seemed unfocused—definitely concussion—but he seemed to be tracking Sherlock’s face without too much difficulty, which was an encouraging sign. “You’re all right?”

Lestrade made a small, amused noise. “Lovely, thanks,” he said, and it sounded like it hurt. “Look, Sherlock, my head, I—“

“I know. It’s all right, but we only have a minute. Listen. I can end it now, if you need— “

Lestrade’s eyes found his, flickered with understanding. “No. No, let’s not stop now. I’ll do. Come this far and all that.”

Foolish. Stubborn.

“You’re sure? It’ll have to be. Well. It’ll _hurt._ ”

Lestrade took a deep breath. He didn’t laugh, or not precisely. “I’m sure.”

Sherlock wished he’d chosen the other way. (It didn’t make sense; stopping now would render everything up to that pointless. And yet.)

It didn’t matter. The fact was that Lestrade wanted to see it through, and by Sherlock’s calculation he owed him this much, at least.

“Right. Okay. When I take the gag off, give a name. Anyone. Say it’s him. Say it’s me, if you must. I’ll work it out. Just be sure he hears you.”

Lestrade almost nodded, thought better of it. “Yeah. And be _careful,_ will you?”

“Always.” Sherlock would have smiled if he hadn’t heard the door beginning to swing open. Instead, he rearranged his face into a threatening grimace. Lestrade shifted his eyes away.

 _You’re good at this._

He supposed he was. Not the time to think about that.

Bassett tossed a filthy rag to him. “You’ll have to use the tape to gag him,” he said as Sherlock wiped his fingers, scrubbed at the blade of the knife. “Unless you want to use _that_ ,” he added, indicating the rag, and the look on Lestrade’s face at that suggestion would have been funny if it hadn’t so closely echoed Sherlock’s own feelings on the matter.

“Amateurs,” he spit out, as derisively as he could manage, and threw the rag in the corner. Lestrade relaxed fractionally, but it didn’t last; the tension came back into his bearing when Sherlock picked up the roll of gaffer tape.

“Oh, don’t fuss about _this,_ of all things,” Sherlock said irritably, just because he wanted Lestrade to know that he’d noticed his anxiety, that he wasn’t alone in it, that Sherlock was paying attention. “Or you can just stop being such a foolish git and make it unnecessary. Either way.”

“Get stuffed.”

Sherlock allowed himself to laugh at that, though he probably shouldn’t have done, because he suspected there was a level on which Lestrade actually meant it.

They might both be all right, after all.

If he were very careful, that is. If he did this right.

 

* * *

 

It had passed over the line into being objectively _too much_ some time ago. Lestrade had lost track—had lost track of time, of what it was he was meant to be saying (not saying? Christ, he couldn’t even remember which of _those_ , not that it mattered), what the purpose of all this even was.

The gag was awful and welcome; it kept him from doing anything stupid. He could feel himself slipping. Odd, to feel himself slipping in and out of coherent thought like this, each moment of clarity like a jolt.

 _Enough_ , he thought, _stop,_ and it didn’t.

* * *

 _Brachioradialis. The extensors: carpi radialis longus, carpi radialis brevis, digitorum, digiti minimi, carpi ulnaris, anconeus._

The most superficial layer.

Broken down into its constituent parts, brightly-coloured and distinct like an anatomy diagram. Mustn’t let himself think about anything else. Just flesh. Peeled back, disconnected.

(Improbably optimistic to assume it’d been contained to that. Also the only way to move forward.)

Lestrade was looking up at the ceiling, making low, growling noises in his throat. He was down three useful fingers on his left hand. The breaks had felt clean, but the joints were swelling rapidly. They’d be painful to set.

 _Deltoid._ Axillary nerve (unfortunate reality: one nerve with so many endings).

There was sweat on Lestrade’s face. On Sherlock’s too; he wiped at it with blood-stained fingers.

So intent was he on his task that he almost didn’t notice the noise in the hall. He snapped at Bassett like he’d been interrupted in the middle of an experiment, of something he wanted to do: “Go see to that.”

Turned back to his work.

Oh. _Oh._

Sherlock practically threw himself backward. He was shaking; mustn’t drop the knife (just in case, it might not have worked, please let it have worked) so he didn’t, held onto it as he scrubbed his hands through his hair.

The door opened and John slipped through it.

(Sherlock could think of two times he’d been more relieved to see him. Still. _John._ )

“What in the bloody hell is going on in here?” John was gaping, taking in the scene, and Sherlock decided to leave him to that. He’d catch up soon enough.

He let the knife fall (wouldn’t need it now) with a loud clatter on the cement floor and that, at least, got Lestrade’s attention. Sherlock was at his side in an instant, pulling the tape away from his mouth with fingers that were slick with his blood and wouldn’t steady enough to grip, damn them.

“You’re all right?” he asked breathlessly, his voice not really sounding like his own, and Lestrade’s eyes found his.

Lestrade took a deep, shuddering breath, wincing, and Sherlock felt his hand move out almost involuntarily, needing to somehow _fix_ what he’d—

“Fucking _ow_ , you bastard,” Lestrade said, finally, with something very like the beginnings of a smile.

Oh, God. Not the time to laugh.

Laughing felt like the most natural thing in the world.

Tape on Lestrade’s wrists, still. Right. Sherlock picked up the knife, saw the light catch the blade as it trembled (why couldn’t he stop shaking, why _now_ ), and John’s steady hands took it from him. He released it gratefully.

“Sally,” John said wryly, “is right outside, overseeing the arrest of everything that moves. You, though, she’s planning to murder. Has been planning for hours. Quite elaborate, really. I thought you might want the warning.” He was already cutting away the tape from Lestrade’s wrists and carefully shifting what was left of his shirt, assessing, planning.

“His head,” Sherlock said, because it was important John know. “He’s hit his head. Concussed. Broken fingers on his left hand, and… the rest is obvious.” _Bleeding_ , he meant, and John nodded.

He was suddenly very tired.

Then the door opened and in rushed Donovan, accompanied by what seemed like half the Yard. The whole space exploded in a flurry of motion, but Sherlock had exhausted all his focus and couldn’t seem to follow most of it.

Lestrade’s voice he heard, though, low and hoarse as it was: “Arrest him.”

Everyone was staring at Sherlock. Sherlock, for his part, was staring at Lestrade.

“Can’t stop now,” Lestrade continued. “Don’t blow his cover. Arrest him, take him in, the whole. The whole thing. Make sure the other man sees. Keep it going.”

He was right, of course, damn him.

“ _John,_ ” Sherlock said insistently, because it was the most important thing he could think of at the moment. “His head. Make sure.” The cuffs closed around his wrists.

“On it, don’t worry.” John’s smile was doctorly, reassuring. “There’s an ambulance right out front. You’ll see it on your way out.”

 

* * *

 

It wasn’t the first time Sherlock had been kept in a holding cell in violation of normal procedure—that seemed to be the problem with his arrangement with the Yard; if he got to flaunt the rules, so did they, at least as far as he was concerned—but it was certainly disconcerting to go a whole day without seeing a familiar face.

It wasn’t that he was anxious, exactly, though he would have liked some news. News would be nice.

He would have liked something to occupy his mind. Replaying recent events was… well. Sherlock would have preferred something else.

It was morning on the second day when he was escorted to the visiting room. John was sitting at one of the long tables, looking like he hadn’t slept, and holding a battered paperback.

“Here,” he said, pushing the book across the table. “For the wait. I suppose you must be bored, yeah?”

 _Bored_ was one way of putting it. _Nearly catatonic_ was another.

“Thanks.”

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence, during which Sherlock realised that he couldn’t quite bring himself to ask any of the questions whose answers he wanted so badly to know.

“Sally is insisting you stay here until Lestrade gets out of hospital. He agrees.”

Sherlock suppressed a groan. He supposed he deserved it, really. “Seems fitting.”

John’s mouth quirked into a wry smile. “He wants to come round to collect you himself. Should be later this afternoon; at this point it’s just waiting on some paperwork.”

“He’s all right, then.” It was meant to be a question, but Sherlock found he couldn’t keep his voice from quavering _and_ manage the upward inflection on the end of the sentence, so he settled for the first one.

John shrugged. “He’s been better. But nothing that won’t mend.”

Sherlock let out a relieved breath. “Good. That’s… good.”

“Yeah. Look, Sherlock, it’s not your fault. No one thinks that. Although….” John trailed off, but Sherlock levelled his most withering glare in his direction until he relented. “Those two blokes you sent round Lestrade’s flat. They kept talking about what a psychopath you were, like they were trying to taunt us with it.” John shrugged. “Funny, right? Considering.”

 _You’re good at this._

“Quite funny,” Sherlock said quietly.

“It worked out all right, though.”

Sherlock couldn’t be bothered to comment on that. “What happened? On your end, I mean.”

John looked vaguely surprised. “Has no one told you? Well, after I called you, once I worked out what was happening—smart move, that, by the way—I called Sally up straightaway, and we took a few uniforms by Lestrade’s flat to wait for them. Arrested them, of course. It took them a while to tell us where you were—they just sat there, smirking, telling us how you were—“

“I do actually recall that part,” Sherlock broke in, not wanting to hear it again.

John smiled ruefully. “Yeah, I imagine you do. Right. So, then it was just a matter of coming round to collect you. Which we did.”

“Which you did.”

Another short pause. “I spoke to your brother,” John said.

Oh, _Christ_. “And what did he have to say about the whole mess?”

John grinned. “Well, according to him, the chap you’re after should make his move in a few days. He hasn’t changed his plans, which means the whole thing was a bit of a success. You’ll have to lie low for a few days so he doesn’t realise you aren’t in prison with the others, but… well, it looks like it was all worth it in the end.”

“Looks like,” Sherlock echoed. “What does Lestrade say about that?”

“Those are his words, almost exactly. Minus some local colour. He was getting a tetanus jab at the time,” he explained, to Sherlock’s puzzled look. “Really, Sherlock, he’s fine.” He frowned slightly. “And you? Holding up?”

“Fine,” Sherlock said, waving it away.

“Mm.” A long, thoughtful intake of breath. “You know, surgeons hurt people all the time, in the name of helping them. Soldiers, too, for that matter.” John’s mouth quirked, and he wouldn’t meet Sherlock’s eye. “It’s not always comfortable, but it’s… well. No point in regretting a necessity, is there?”

Sherlock didn’t answer.

John stood. “I should get back to the hospital, see if I can help speed things along a bit,” he said. “See you back at the flat.”

John left, no trace of a limp in his gait as he walked away.

 

 

* * *

 

 

As promised, Lestrade himself appeared to take Sherlock home later that day.

He looked like hell, despite the fact that his clothing covered most of the damage. There was a dark purple bruise spread over his cheek, and one eye was still slightly swollen. His left hand was splinted and swaddled in bandages, and he was holding himself stiffly.

And he was smiling. _Grinning_ , more like, and it took Sherlock only a few moments to register the expression as one of affection.

They looked at each other for a long moment, until finally Lestrade broke the silence with an exasperated noise. “Don’t look so grim. I did ask you to. And it _worked_.”

“Yeah. It did, at that.”

“Didn’t doubt it for a minute.”

 

* * *

 

They ran into Sally in the hall. “Give us a minute,” she said to Lestrade, and he didn’t hesitate to leave them alone, even though Sherlock wanted to ask him to stay.

When they were alone (and Lestrade _was_ limping slightly, Sherlock noted with a pang), she said, “He’s a mess, you know.”

Sherlock didn’t know what to say to that, so he just nodded.

She looked at him, sizing him up like she’d never seen him before. “A bit terrifying, really, that you know how to do that. But, well. Could’ve been worse, couldn’t it? And he walked away. So. Well, _thanks_ , I suppose.”

She was thanking him, actually thanking him, and for _this_ of all things.

“Anytime,” he said, distantly, some odd vestiges of polite form surfacing at the precise wrong moment, making him sound foolish.

(Would he, again? Yes, if they asked.)

Sherlock thought about the slick feel of blood on skin, his own shaking hand.

(John’s hand shook, too, and he’d shot a man the day after they met. _No point in regretting a necessity._ )

Sally laughed. “Lucky you’re on our side.”

He thought he really had to agree.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [this prompt](http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/6487.html?thread=31211095#t31211095) over at sherlockbbc_fic:
> 
>  _Sherlock thinks he can go undercover with a crime organization/gang/whatever and get key information or solve a crime, but he needs a "captive" to make his plan work. The Met thinks it's too risky, so they refuse to provide an undercover copper or a backup team. Lestrade, however, thinks Sherlock can do it, and he volunteers to let himself be captured. He knows things could get ugly and he'll have to play along, but he trusts Sherlock to give him cues to follow._
> 
>  _Things go pear-shaped and Sherlock ends up having to "interrogate" Lestrade rather brutally to save both their lives._


End file.
